New Delhi, Sept 12 (Agencies): At least 60 people were killed in Madhya Pradesh on Saturday when a cooking gas cylinder blew up in a restaurant and set fire to explosives stored nearby, police said.

The LPG cylinder exploded as people were gathering for breakfast at the restaurant in Petlawad in Jhabua district, Inspector B.L. Gaur said. At least 60 people were injured, Gaur added.

The death toll is expected to rise as rescue workers pull more bodies from under the rubble of the collapsed building, another police official said.

Television channel NDTV said more than 80 people were feared dead, without citing sources.

Gaur said the restaurant was near an area where gelatine sticks used at construction sites were stored.

“There was a second explosion, there were more casualties,” Gaur said, adding the blast was so powerful it damaged adjacent buildings and ripped out nearby windows.

Television footage showed a crowd of people standing amid the rubble of a building as excavators started clearing debris from the site.

”This is a tragic incident... The causes …will be investigated,” Madhya Pradesh's chief minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan told local television channels.

Chouhan has announced compensation for the victims' families, media reported.